The Evolution of a Relationship
by ErinHeartsSTR
Summary: Hermy and Ron are at it again, trying to figure out "them". T for light language.
1. Chapter 1

D.C- yeah, no. I wish.  
Also, a bit AU, but still somewhat in cannon... in other words- it has nothing to do with the books other than the people involved.

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Hermione Granger stalked out of the Gryffindor Common Room, swinging the portrait open so furiously, she squished a gaggle of second year boys between the wall and the Fat Lady's large bosom. The boys blushed bright red, and hurried inside, wanting to avoid the fight that the portrait would start and the Head Girl would participate in.

"Young lady! I do not care what inclination you think you have to burst around like that! I will accept an apology, if you are willing to give one," the Fat Lady finished icily.

The Head Girl opened her mouth, closed it, and then opened it again, letting out a giant sigh. Her shoulders sagged and felt her eyes water.

_I need to get outside and take a walk._ Hermione turned on her heel and started down the stairs leading from Gryffindor Tower to the lush, spring green Hogwarts Grounds.

"Do I even get an apology, miss?" she said to the Gryffindor's back. "Apparently not!" she finished with a huff.

Hermione ignored the portrait and started her slow decent to the April weather and flora. Once she made it outside, Hermione wished she had brought her cloak. It was a little colder since Herbology class that morning. _What did we learn today? Oh that's right, the healing properties of a Muggle species- the Paddle Plant. Funny looking plant, really. And it was funny when Ron cracked that joke- oh Merlin, there I go again... why can't I ever stop thinking about him?_

She walked along the edge of the lake remembering the day in their sixth year that they had decided to go swimming.

Ron, Harry, Hermione, and a few other assorted Gryffindor sixth years were scattered around the lake; throwing each other in, dunking, spitting water, splashing, and having a grand old time.

Ron had grabbed Hermione and pulled her in after him. They had both surfaced, laughing. The lake was shallow enough that Ron could stand easily; his head well above the surface. Hermione was having a little more trouble.

"Ron, Ron, I can't stand here!" she said, half laughing, half serious. Her chin was barely bobbing on the surface.

"Do you want some help then?" he asked. Without waiting for an answer he wrapped one of his strong arms around her, lifting her well out of the water. In response, she wrapped one of her arms around his neck to steady her upper body.

"Thank you," she said, not yet noticing the position they were in.

"Any time," he smiled at her. A moment of realization flickered across his mind. Realizing where his hands were, and on who's body. "Uh, Mione? I'm getting a little cold. Do you wanna get out?" He had already started walking to the shore of the lake.

"Do I have a choice?"

"Nope."

"Didn't think so."

"Besides, I wouldn't want my best friend to get pneumonia or something."

"Ronald, it's 26 degrees(AN: That's about 80F, just so you know.)! I'm not going to catch pneumonia when it's this warm out."

* * *

"Just checking," he cast her a cocky grin, and she chuckled.

She smiled, remembering that day. She hadn't realized until later why Ron was "cold".

_I'm such an idiot. He obviously doesn't like me if he doesn't want to even touch me. Though he had broken up with Lavender... maybe I'm just imagining things..._

"Knut for your thoughts," a deep voice said, just to the right of her ear. Hermione jumped in surprise. She turned her head to look into the eyes of her other best friend, Harry Potter.

"Nothing worthwhile..."

"Don't say that... I saw you rush out of the Common room. And I think I know why. Don't make me pull it out of you Hermione."

She knew she could trust Harry. He would understand. "I just don't see why he doesn't get it! Am I making too obvious? Or not obvious enough?"

"Ron?"

"Need you ask?"

"Probably not... Come on Hermione, he's probably the most oblivious guy in our year. He wouldn't notice a good thing for him if it came up and slapped him across the face." Harry looked at his friend knowingly. "Which yes, I know, you have done your fair share of times. Just maybe... maybe you should sit down with him and talk. Just write it out for him."

"But I don't know if I want to lay my heart on the line like that."

"Trust me, you won't be." Harry said reassuringly. "Just tell him how you feel."

"I'll think about it," Hermione said sulkily.

"Here, take this if you're going to be out here any longer." He handed her a cloak.

"How'd you get into my dorm? No, wait, don't answer that. I'm not sure I want to know."

Harry just smiled innocently and let his friend be.

_Tell him what? _Hermione thought to her self. _That I'm completely, honestly in love with him? And he probably doesn't even know my middle name? Not that it's used very often... but still. It's one of those things best friends know about each other... Has he ever thought of me as more than "just a friend"? Probably not... but I'll never know if I don't do something about it... I wonder what our children would look like. Would they have my hair or his? I think I would want them to have the Weasley hair. That would be best. I could be a Weasley... wow. Never thought of it like that._

Hermione looked up, and noticed it had gotten quite dark. _I must have missed dinner. Damn. I'll just go to the Kitchens then. It should be past the rush now anyways..._She started to the steps of the Great Hall towards the food that beckoned her. In due time, she arrived at the bowl of fruit painting, tickled the pear, and entered the Hogwart's Kitchens. Before she saw any house elves, she saw one person already sitting at a large central table. That person was Ron Weasley.

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I'm not really to sure about this one... I like it enough, but I dunno... still on the fence about it. Let me know what you think.

3 Airin


	2. Chapter 2

A continuation, but I'm not sure if I like it very much. Just getting it out of my head really. Enjoy.  
Disclaimer- haha, yeah right.

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_Oh shite. Out of all the people... why her? Is she still mad at me? Probably. But why is she mad? I haven't a clue. _His thoughts turned to a quick flashback of the Common Room about two hours before.

Hermione was looking through one of his essays for Charms. She was making a corrections here and there. Movement around the hearth caught his eye. The long, silky frame of Lavender Brown passed in front of the fire. _And I sure as hell don't like her anymore, but she is nice to look at... _

"Ronald. What are you looking at?" Hermione was finished going through his essay.

"Huh? Oh, no one."

"So it's a person?" She turned to follow where his eyes were juts a moment ago. After passing over a few younger students, her eyes found Lavender. A quizzical look was traded for a pissed off look in about 2 seconds of recognition. "Honestly? Really, Ron? You can't at least pretend?"

She stood up and stormed out of the Common Room. He thought he saw tears welling in her eyes. _Way to go, you dumb arse. You can't keep doing this to her. You like her, no love actually, and you can't get your courage up to do something about it. Why even bother chasing after her? I'll just make it worse..._

His thoughts were interrupted by the noise a group of second year boys were making by the portrait hole.

"That was awful! That girl looked like she was ready to cry..."

"Are you kidding?! Don't be such a wimp. That was friggin' hilarious, mate!" They made their way to the boys dormitories laughing and punching each other.

Harry and Ginny made their way over. "Wow, what'd you do big brother?"

"I'm not sure. Well, I am. But I'm not proud of it."

"I know why," Harry started with a chuckle. "Want me to go talk to her?" He turned to Ginny. "How bout, I'll get her and you can stay here and knock some sense into him?"

"Works for me." Ginny said, pushing him towards the portrait hole. "Go work wonders."

"Don't I always?" he kidded.

"Unfortunately, yes." she finished sarcastically, smiling and laughing.

"So really? What'd you do? Harry and I were a little.. uh, preoccupied to notice what was going on."

After giving his sister the too-much-info look, he started. "Well, Hermione was checking over my Charms essay and then Lavender caught my eye, but not because she's Lavender, just because something was moving and it happened to be her. Either way, I watched her, just remembering stuff, and then Hermione got her knickers in a twist and started going off on me. Which yeah, I might have deserved, but to storm out in front of the whole common room? A little much?"

"No, she was completely within her rights to storm any where and any time she wants. You're just too mentally challenged to say something to her about how much you kinda, sorta love her, and not have all of these silly little tiffs any more." Ginny looked at her brother knowingly and prodded him with her finger. "So say something all ready! We're all waiting for it."

Instead of waiting for an answer, she just walked away, towards one of her friends, and left Ron to think.

_I can't keep doing this to her, that's for sure, but how do I tell her? I could just tell her, but I want it to be special... but maybe this wouldn't be the time to be special, maybe this would be the time to be truthful. _

Ron put his head back to think. He closed his eyes, and his breathing steadied. He didn't notice everyone emptying out of the Common Room for dinner, and promptly fell asleep.

He woke up a while later, most people were trickling back in from dinner. His stomach was going to start making noises soon, so he just went down to the Kitchens to tuck him in before breakfast the next morning.

"Uh, 'lo Mione. Fancy seeing you here," he finished unevenly. He wasn't sure if she was still mad at him or not.

"Yes, fancy that Ron. Fancy that," she turned away to say something to the house elves, and a second later she was sitting next to Ron with her plate of spaghetti, twirling her fork and chewing.

She ate in silence, seeing as Ron was too afraid to say any thing, and she didn't have the energy to. Hermione finished her dinner, and turned to Ron. "Can we talk?"

"Sure, want to back to heads dormitories, or what?"

"That's fine." she gave him a slight smile. They thanked the house elves and started upwards towards their own dorms. After climbing a few flights of stairs they arrived at their dormitories. A large painting was the entrance to their room.

"Password?" a rather fat man in the painting asked them.

"Banshee," Ron said, bouncing up and down on his toes, and becoming quite impatient. The portrait grunted in approval and swung open.

The Heads dorms were not exceptionally large, but more comfortable and cozy. A fire crackled in the corner with a small seating area arranged around it. It also had many book shelves, a well sized homework table, and two doors leading to their separate bedrooms. They entered and sat down on the couch near the fire.

After a few moments of uncomfortable silence, Ron broke it.

"Mione, I'm sorry, I was looking at Lavender. She's not worth it."

"I'm sorry for flying off the handle like that... but there isn't any reason that you can't look at her."

"I'd like for there to be a reason, though."

"And what reason would that be?" Hermione inwardly sighed. They would talk like this for a while, then go back right into the routine of fighting and arguing. Every day he would do something, not necessarily bad, but she would weird out and blow up at him, storm around for a while, then they would make up, and the cycle would start again. It was starting to get very tiring. It takes a lot of energy to be mad as much as she was.

"That I should be looking at someone else like that instead," Ron wondered if he was making it obvious enough. He wondered if he should just come out and say it, or if eluding to it would be better.

Hermione raised her eye brows in response. "And that someone else would be?"

He looked into her eyes. The deep chocolate brown orbs that were swirling with emotion. The fire was creating fantastic shadows over her body. She had pulled her hair up into a loose bun, tendrils hanging out here and there. She probably wouldn't win a beauty contest any time soon, but she was gorgeous in his eyes.

"You. That someone else would be you."

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So...? Yes? No? Review please.


	3. Chapter 3

D.C-Not mine, really.  
Enjoy:)  


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Hermione wasn't sure how many seconds had passed between Ron's confession that he wanted her, and only her, and her blurted mistake of, "What?!" This was not how she was expecting this conversation to go.

"You. I hoped it would be you."

She looked at him full of disbelief. Hermione then realized that it had been a while since she had said something. Awkward silences were her specialty. She shook her head in means to clear it. "You know you surprise me sometimes Ron, I wasn't expecting that at all. Nice little laugh though; you really had me going there for a second," a nervous little laugh concluded her rambling, and she was wringing her hands- a tell-tale sign she was this close to start biting her nails and sucking on her hair.

"Hermione," Ron said, dead serious. "Hermione, love, I'm not kidding."

"Oh."

"I mean it."

"Uh-huh."

"You don't believe me do you?" She looked up at him and his crystal eyes, and she saw nothing but honesty. But something in the back of her mind just couldn't decide whether to trust him or not.

"I'm not sure... I think I do Ron, but I'm just not sure."

Ron sighed, and closed his eyes. Then, he looked at Hermione and saw only uncertainty pulsing through her chocolate brown eyes. He wanted her so badly, he wanted a 'them', more than he could imagine. He wanted to fly her off into the sunset, he wanted her to be his princess, he wanted her. Her, period. A thought flashed through his head, something that he hoped would definitely prove his confession. Ron brushed his hand up and along Hermione's arm, feeling her shudder despite the warmth of the fire. His hand wrapped around her neck, and slowly pulled her closer to him. He saw her eyes slide slowly shut, her head tilting to the right, and her lips looked like they were yearning for his. Before they knew it, Ron's lips were on top of Hermione's, one hand under her chin, and the other on her lower back. Her hands were intwined in his hair, pulling him closer. She was thinking, _I wanted this so bad, why was I denying myself this? _He was thinking, _Merlin, I have waited too long for the sweetest lips in Britain, if not the whole world. _He was barely comprehending she was opening her mouth more, and his tongue was sliding towards the edge of his lips until he noticed what was going on and pulled back. Hermione was not happy with this abrupt change of events.

"What?" she asked, slightly annoyed.

"Do you believe me yet?" Ron asked. "I need to know if you do."

"Yes, yes, I do." she smiled, and blushed slightly.

"Good." he pulled her face back down to his, and let her take the lead. She deepened the kiss, their tongues intertwining, exploring each others mouths. He slowly leaned back on the couch pulling her on top of him. After a long enjoyable snog session (at least Ron thought so anyway) Hermione pulled away, and laid her head on his chest, looking into the fire and smiling contently.

"Are you going to ask me something, Ronald?"

"Uh, was I supposed to?"

"Ron, Ron, Ron. Really?" she said half in fake disbelief, half in jest.

He looked at her blankly then a shot of thought crashed into his head. "Oh! Oh, right, sorry. Hermione, would you be my girlfriend?"

"Well, I was just thinking about Hogsmede next weekend, you know, a good weekend fling; but if that's what was on your mind..."

"Mione!

"Yes, Ron, I will."

This made Ron very happy indeed. So happy in fact, that the interrupted snogging was back in session. The next time, it was Ron to break the kiss.

After a minute or so, he said: "Hermione?"

"Yes, Ronald?" her head was back on his chest, arms around his neck. His top button was ripped out of it's hole, his collar was askew, and his hair was messier than usual.

"Err..." he looked down at her. "Well, did you and McLaggen... uh, you know," Ron asked her exasperatedly.

"No, Ron, I can't say, I do know," she giggled inwardly, wanting to draw this out for as long as possible.

"Hermione! You do know! Come on, you know!" She just raised an eyebrow. "Did you guys ever get, uh... far?"

"How far, Ronald?"

"Merlin's beard, Mione, just tell me!"

She laughed, "No, I wouldn't let that slimy arse touch me."

The look of relief on Ron's face was priceless. "Oh, well. Good." Then a second after for recognition: "Hey, you just swore!"

"Did not."

"Did too!"

"Didn't."

"You did too!"

"Nuh-uh."

"Yeah-huh!"

"I don't know what you're talking about, Ronald," she said, a smile playing on her lips. But he never got to see that smile because very soon afterwards, their lips were involved in something else that went on until the fire turned to embers, the two said their 'good nights', and went to bed.  


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Eeek, this chap was a wee bit short. I didn't want to keep going too late, plus I find it impossible to write long chapters without a good, strong story line. Anyways!  
To my reviewers- **ObsessedRHShipper-** haha, hope I did that well enough for you.  
-**gryffindorlion4- **Thanks so much! Oh me too, they were my favorite 3  
-**BeanOwnsEnder-** I think I might continue with just an extra scene or two after this. I don't have that much time on my hands as it is.  
-**x3naa-** Thanks:) yeah, things make a lot more sense in my head than they do on paper. It made sense to me when I was writing it and going over it, but then after wards it was like- wait, what? buy to answer your question yes, I had envisioned Ron draining a firewhiskey in sorrow then Hermy walking in and him flipping out-like oh crap!- i'm not sure if that got across well enough or not :/

Thanks so much you guys! Expect more soon!

-- 3 Airin


	4. Chapter 4

D.C-Not mine. Never will be.  
Enjoy:)

* * *

The morning after Hermione and Ron were officially together, Ron decided to make his love breakfast. Rich, fluffy pancakes, an omelet, some fresh bread, and freshly squeezed orange juice. Hermione awoke to the sizzling of bacon on the griddle, and cling-clanging of dish ware and utensils. She stretched, and remembering last nights events, smiled through her yawn. She felt new and refreshed. All of her feelings from the past five years were out in the open. Hermione swung her legs over the edge of her bed and her toes felt around from her slippers. When she located them, she slipped them on, then quickly switching them because they were on the wrong feet. She pulled her bath robe on and walked into their shared bathroom. She brushed her teeth, patted her hair down, and exited into the common area.

"Ah, you finally woke up," Ron said, pulling the last slices of pork off the stove, and on to a plate. He enveloped her in a huge hug, and kissed her lightly. They sat down at the table set for two, which was set up next to the large window that looked over the grounds.

Hermione giggled, "Good morning to you too," she then looked at the food in front of her. "Ronald, this looks delicious, thank you."

"Well, when a mum cooks as good as mine does, you pick up on a few things." They both piled their plates with eggs, pancakes, bacon, and toast. Ron poured them both orange juice and coffee.

She took a bite, "Mmm, the pancakes are heavenly." Hermione had closed her eyes, savoring the taste.

They ate in comfortable silence for the rest of the breakfast. After they were both comfortably full and satisfied, they cleaned up and sat down on their couch. The fire was up, and they were both warm, which was fortunate. The castle was quite drafty, no matter what the weather. Hermione had her head on Ron's chest, and he was slouched against the back of couch- half sitting, half lying down. They were both very comfortable.

Recalling a conversation last night, Hermione said, "Ron?"

"Hmmm?"

"Did you ever have sex with Lavender?" she asked bluntly.

A bit taken aback, he replied, "No... no I didn't. And this matters why?"

"Well, it matters, obviously," Ron could hear her eyes roll. "But really, I was just curious."

"So, no reason?"

"None," she paused. "Ron?"

"Huh?"

"Did you ever see her breasts?"

Now, Ron was considerably flustered by this question. "Hermione, honestly. It doesn't matter. I never really liked her. Just leave it alone."

"You didn't answer my question." she replied, being quite stubborn.

"God damn, Mione. No, okay? No."

"Oh, really? Huh..."

"What?"

"Nothing," Hermione's tone left much to be discovered.

"No, really, what?"

"I just thought she was easier than she appears to be. She's quite a tart, you know." She replied, poking him in the arm to emphasize her point.

He blushed, "Yeah, I think, I know."

"Good."

"So, are we done discussing this?"

"For now." she just smiled, and let him wonder.

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I'm pretty sure this is the last chapter. I didn't want to get too into nothingness. Like it? Hate it? Tell me!


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